For a COVID-19 like pandemic, the Achilles heel is an unsuspecting villain – rapid and global land use changes. The way governments, businesses and communities see, relate to and use land, not only influences the outbreak but also determines their impact on humanity and development. Drawing...

Epidemics may have social scarring effects, increasing the likelihood of social unrest. They may also have mitigating effect, suppressing unrest by dissuading social activities. Using a new monthly panel on social unrest in 130 countries, we find a positive cross-sectional relationship between...

In this paper we analyze the dynamics among past major pandemics, economic growth, inequality, and social unrest. We provide evidence that past major pandemics, even though much smaller in scale than COVID-19, have led to a significant increase in social unrest by reducing output and increasing...